End of an Era: The Hunt
by Dark demon619
Summary: The War with the Covenant is ending, but while a Spartan and Marine hunt down one of its final leaders, they will encounter allies and enemys that they've never seen before.OCs included. Review please. Note Rewrites are taking place at the moment.
1. Chapter 1:Mission Specs

**Note**: **This story contains characters that are not from either Metroid or Halo, they were created by myself, if you have any questions about the story, please send me a message or put it in a reveiw.**

"Status report."

"Scan complete, No contacts detected, target has fled the system."

"Damn, well…. take us out and head toward next scouted target."

Robert sighed as he lend back into his chair, they have been tracking their target for three months now. Searching a number of unknown systems for a primary target in a mission that was given to them from the Shipmaster of the Shadow of Intent, Rtas 'Vadum.

__Three month's ago__

"AAGH Show you Demon!"

A Brute Captain snarled, the high lord of the Covenant, Commander of the Great Journey, The Prophet of Truth is just moments away from lighting the holy rings and starting the Great journey. But something has gone amiss, not only has the parasite desecrated this holy relic and brought what remains of High Charity with them, but his entre pack along with the grunts and jackals have been slaughtered by something that resembles the Demon himself.

"The dawn of your destruction is at hand, the Great Journey is about to commence!"

A hidden figure passes by the Brute without him noticing, blinded by his faith, unnoticing to the armored assailant creeping up behind him.

"But before the Great Journey commences, I shall feast on your spin…..AAGh!"

"Do you ever get tired of saying that stupid fraise of yours?"

As the Brute gasped for air he came to realize where both that voice and his loss of air came from. A Spartan, a demon as his eyes see it, was standing behind him, with a sharp combat knife jabbing into the neck of the Captain in-between the slits of his power armor. The Brute's eyes turned white with emptiness, his movements went limp and shallow, and finally dropped to the ground, dead.

The Spartan pulled his blade from the Brute's corpse and wiped the blood from its side, scraping off any remains of his kill. As he put the blade back in its holster, he retrieved his rifle from a nearby stone that was set aside for his movement around the brute.

"This is Spartan 048, area cleared of hostiles awaiting further orders."

"Good hunting demon" An Elite replied.

"Who is this? I am trying to contact Commander Keyes." He questioned.

"The Shipmaster requests your presence demon; a phantom is on its way."

As the phantom arrived, the Spartan climbed abroad along with the remainder of his squad

who had been finishing off a group of jackals stationed on rocks high above their location. Even though everyone in the phantom knew of the truce between the humans and Elites, they could not shake the feelings that had been engraved in their minds since the start of this war years earlier.

The phantom soon arrived at the Shadow of intent, a massive Covenant carrier that while damaged from the debits from the infected High Charity, is still in working order. Along with other Phantoms, Sprits, and even Pelicans, the Spartan's Phantom entered the docking bay of the ship. After the docking was complete, the remaining marines headed to the staging area while the Spartan was joined by two Elites so they could escort him to the control room.

As the Elites escorted the Spartan, he could not shake all the memories of past time onboard these ships, but not as a guest being escorted to the Shipmaster's control room. All he could remember was dodging plasma bolts and grenades flying past his head while running and gunning though these ship's many hallways and corridors. But he regained his since of mind once they reached the control room, a massive station that not only looked like but preformed similar to the deck of a Frigate.

"Welcome Spartan, I hope your hunting was enjoyable." Rtas 'Vadum, the Shipmaster of the Shadow of Intent greeted the Spartan.

"Yes, it was sir"

"Good, now Spartan I need something from you, a mission of great importance"

"I am prepared sir, but may I ask to speak to Commander Keyes first?"

The Shipmaster lowered his head.

"I am sorry; she fell to the bastard Truth, before the Arbiter could silence that worm for good."

The Spartan felt terrible about this but ignored it, of course he couldn't let the Elite notice this.

"That's…unfortunate, what's the mission?"

"Ah, come with me, I'll tell you on the way."

Rtas stood up from his seat and began to walk toward a nearby door, the Spartan was dumbstruck for a moment, he had seen many elites in his day, killed more than he wished, but Rtas was the most intimidating elite he has been in the presence of, even for a shipmaster. But this didn't last long, and he soon joined him down a nearby hallway.

"I need you for a hunt." Rtas spoke in a calm and amused tone.

"What kind of Hunt?"

Rtas looked off into the vastness of space, watched as the ships in his fleet surrounded one of the few remaining ships in Truth's, a lone carrier that was already damaged to almost scrap metal remains. For what the Spartan could tell, Rtas had a small smirk on his face as the ships in his command blasted it to near annihilation.

"All but one of the final leaders of the Covenant has been dealt with, and with the infection here, now, I can't spare a ship to chase this worm."

"And what worm do you need to be hunted?" The Spartan questioned

"A chieftain, the very same chieftain that captured your sergeant at the shield generator"

The Spartan remembered that monster, it was the first mission his squad was given while on the Ark, to provide backup to Johnson in case they were overwhelmed while trying to take down the generator. After Johnson was attacked, Keyes ordered his team to head there at once, but they were delayed when their Pelican was shot down and couldn't get to Johnson in time.

"Where is he?"

"Gone, he returned to his ship and waited for orders."

While staring into the derbies of the destroyed carrier, the Spartan wondered.

"Didn't you just destroy the last of Truth's ships? Wouldn't he be dead?"

"No, after the shield went down, he fled the system, into the void of space."

"So, you want me to take my men to chase him down and bring him back here?"

Rtas turned to the Spartan, unsheathed his energy sword, and ignited it.

"Do what you wish Spartan, either way, that monster will pay for his crimes by my sword."

Rtas pointed his blade at the Spartan. Out of old habits and memories, the Spartan grabbed a hold of his knife and prepared to slice back in retaliation.

"..or by yours."

Rtas deactivated his sword and handed it to the Spartan. While at first the Spartan was confused, he soon understood what this jester meant. He took the blade, nodded, and walked away, to prepare for the upcoming mission.

The Spartan soon approached the very same staging area that his squad had stopped off at when they first boarded the Shadow of Intent. This area is where the UNSC set up shop in the Shadow of Intent, seeing how they had none left of their own that could deal with the fleet Truth had lead through the portal. While on his way there, he has informed by a Elite of the ship he would use doing the mission, one that had been upgraded with their technology so he could better pursue his target.

The Spartan headed toward his marines, all joking around, celebrating the victory over the Covenant. He focused his attention on just one of them, a standard marine holding a sniper rifle and wearing a cowboy hat, a man named Jack.

"Spartan on deck!" Shouted a nearby Marine, showing his respect for the warrior.

"At ease, Jack come with me, we have business, the rest of you can return to your duties."

Jack sat up and started towed the Spartan while the rest of the marines conitnued with their party, breaking out beer and even inviting a few Elites to join them.

"What business do you have with me sir?"

"I need you for a mission, one given by The Shipmaster himself."

Jack turned in surprise, put a fresh clip in his rifle, and asked.

"What's the mission?"

__present time__


	2. Chapter 2: Arrival

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"Sir, come take a look at this." Jack said while plotting destinations.

The Spartan stood up from his seat and walked over to him. If it weren't for his visor, Jack would have noticed the grin that had formed on his face.

"Report" The Spartan replied.

"Well, I've traced the routes of this brute's ship and its lead to a planet."

The Spartan's grin disappeared.

"How is this gona be different from the last twenty planets we've been to?"

Jack didn't really notice what the Spartan even said, he just went on with his plan and typing in info into the Fighter's computer.

"For one, if we head there now, we should get there at the same time as the brute and cut him off"

The Spartan's interest returned.

"Well that's good, but what's the other part?"

Jack turned around and stared at the Spartan. But not before he loaded up a map of space, or as it be , a makeshift map of space since nether the Covenant or the UNSC had explored any of this area of space beyond the portal to the massive Forerunner Relic, the Ark.

"And two, this planet is at the rim of our universe."

The Spartan didn't take him seriously at first, "What?"

Jack turned back to the chart and pointed to the section that was posted after the planet he discovered.

"After this planet, there's nothing, no stars, no planets, no black holes, nothing, my scans won't even go beyond that planet, that's it."

The Spartan didn't know what to think of this, the last of his race's most hated enemy is headed to a planet at the rim of the universe, he couldn't think of anything it could do there that could make a difference in the war, but it still didn't feel right. But even if it was unsettling, he knew this may be their only chance to catch it before it was once again out of reach.

"How long will it take for us to arrive?"

"Well Rob, it'll us about two days until we can blow off that monkey's head off."

The Spartan sighed as he returned to his seat.

"Don't call me that…..let's just get going before we miss our chance."

"Aye Aye Sir." Jack replied.

Jack locked in the coordinates of the planet into the fighter's navigation controls. The fighter's FTL drive were activated imminently, something that if not were for the Elite's modifications, it wouldn't be possible. All non-necessary systems were deactivated, and Jack closed the blast shields on the bridge as the Fighter went into Slipspace.

__Two days later__

The Fighter exited out of Slipspace about five miles from orbit, the planet was about twice the size of Earth, with a orbit filled with the remains and debits of ships, ships that had a few designs that didn't seem UNSC or Covenant.

"Sir, we're here." Jack said while reactivating systems and opening the blast shields.

The Spartan gazed at the planet, it reminded him of the broken, destroyed remains of the worlds he was forced to abandon to the Covenant. Destroyed remains of defeated fleets, barren landscapes from the effects of battle were all evident even from orbit, something that made the Spartan very uneasy since the war had never reached this far in the universe.

"This is screwed up, out of all these ships; I can only recognize one, a Covenant destroyer, and an old one at that."

That made both of them even more uneasy, if one of these ships were Covenant, then who's was the rest? But the Spartan ignored this feeling, and focused on his mission.

"Is he here?" The Spartan asked

Jack brought up a hologram of the planet, as he flipped a few switches on the control panel, a scan was deployed. It displayed nothing at first, for a few minutes nothing happened, it was not until the scan had reached the southern portion of the planet did it find something.

"One Covenant Carrier detected, looks like its him…Finally."

"Any ideas on what he's doing?"

Jack continued to pull data from the scan, things from information on the landscape to the data gathered from the remains of the ships in orbit. The Spartan waited for his answer while Jack reviewed the info, hoping to get something useful when he finally finished.

"Nope." Jack said while adjusting his hat.

The Spartan was disappointed, but he was pleased in at least one way, they found him, after over three months of searching an uncharted area of space for one damn brute, they finally found it. He had one plan in mind when he found the son of a bitch, and it was to plant his shot gun between its head and send it one a one way trip to the end of its "Great Journey".

"Let's go give our friend a little hello" Jack said with a huge smile on his face.

The Fighter blasted off into the field of debits that surrounded the planet's orbit, observing the wrecks as they pass by. The remains of these ships seemed odd in many ways, their designs varied from ancient ships from long before the war even began to a few that didn't seem like anything ever seen before, something even beyond the Covenant and Forerunners themselves.

As the Fighter entered the planet's atmosphere, its true terrain became visible. The base of its land was comprised of open fields of lush green grass, like open parries back on Earth, but large structures seem to burst from the ground and litter the landscape. Some in which seemed to be Forerunner, but others looked far different, something older, yet seemed to be able to stand thinf that even Heavy military outposts couldn't. Of a different design, some kind of temples from a different religion other than the Covenant, or something completly different.

"I'll set us down about two miles from the ship; I don't want us to get blown out of sky."

The Fighter decreased its altitude as it prepared to land, deploying landing gear and cooling its engines. As the fighter prepared to land, the Spartan took this chance to gather the supplies he'd need to complete his mission. He walked to the rear of the fighter where the weapon lockers were kept. He grabbed two of his preferred weapons, a UNSC grade shotgun and battle rifle along with enough ammo to take down about twenty Hunters.

But before he left, he noticed Rtas's energy sword that was given to him onboard the Shadow of Intent. As he remembered his exact words, he grabbed the sword and fastened it to the magnetic clamp on his leg right before Jack lowered the lift to the ground.

"Jack, go find a safer place to dock the ship and await further orders."

"Yes Sir."

The Spartan climbed down from the fighter, Battle rifle in hand, and watched as the Longsword's landing gear retracted and engines ignited as it rose from the surface and blew through the sky like a leaf on the sky's windy breeze.


	3. Chapter 3: A New Threat

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For two hours, the Spartan walked, given the information and destination of the Brute's carrier from Jack, he figured he'd be there by now. As he walked through this landscape, there were a few things that caught his attention. The very same structures that Jack and him viewed from orbit were starting to come into view, some of them looked ancient, made of stone but they at the same time they had these characteristics that made him think of the Forerunners, a kind of structure that seem like nothing anyone today would create.

But these thoughts were ripped from his train of thought when Jack burst over the radio with something important.

"Sir! Two unknown ships have entered the atmosphere; one of them is larger than a Covenant carrier!"

"And the other?" The Spartan responded.

"Hard to tell, not that big though, hell it may be just as big as ours."

The Spartan looked into the sky, the scraps of the fleets of ships were still visible of the surface of the planet, from here their numbers seemed to multiple, from hundreds to thousands of ships were scattered across the sky. But two ships caught his eye, for one, these ships were intact, which was something to sat since ninety percent of these ships were torn to shreds.

The second thing was that they were moving. Almost all of the broken remains of these ships were only drifting in orbit and the only ones that ever moved any faster than that were entering the atmosphere and burning to a crisp. But these two were moving closer to the planet at a very high acceleration speed, with both shields and more importantly weapons active and firing. Jack was right that one of these ships were larger than a Covenant Carrier, it was downright massive.

It made the _Shadow of Intent_ seem like a UNSC Frigate compared to that thing.

But the other ship, for its size it was almost impossible to see for any standard human or even Elite to see without any type of magnification in any way at that distance, but a Spartan was different. He could see it clearly, it was a strange looking ship for sure, it had three engines that were stationed at the bottom of its frame, blasting with a speed that didn't even seem to be possible for a ship with that design.

It had a orange paint job along with a green coated windshield, something that reminded him of a helmet, but one of a design he'd never seen before. He didn't to know how this tiny ship was standing up to that massive monster of a ship, but it was dodging massive bombardments of fire power that rivaled a armada of Covenant Destroyers.

But something did happen, a shuttle of some kind was deployed from the larger ship, it was something similar to an Elite or ODST Drop pod, and it was heading for the Spartan's position. It had a jagged form, from a distance it even looked like the ship had fired a sort of harpoon instead of a shuttle, but the closer it came to impact, the more its technological and navel aspects became apparent.

The structure impacted the ground with the force to prerace multiple layers of a carrier's armor, the way it impacted the ground and even its design made it seem more like a spear than a shuttle.

The Spartan approached the shuttle, rifle at the ready and prepared to fire at anything that he deemed hostile. As the Spartan was about ten yards from the shuttle seemed to activate, steam blasted from the seams of the shuttle, they only stopped when the hatches on the shuttle seemed to open, dropping downright from all sides of the shuttle, creating four doorways to the shuttle.

The Spartan was surprised in a way to what climbed out of the shuttle; it had the characteristics of many creatures he knew of. Its figure had many resemblances of Elites, a large humanoid body but with a few obvious differences like having large insect legs that bend back farther than Elites would. Its arms were much different; few had gigantic pincer claws in place of normal hands.

"Hello?" the Spartan questioned.

The Spartan lowered his weapon and approached the creatures, which at first seemed peaceful for the moment.

One of the creatures stared at him for a moment, gathering its thoughts on the strange newcomer it and its men had encountered. The Spartan was ready to speak to the creatures again when the leader of these creatures let out a horrible shriek, something that the Spartan had never heard before. It sounded something similar to a Jackal getting stepped on by a hunter crossed with a Flood combat forms battle cry.

Even with the ongoing annoyance of this creature's scream, the Spartan raised his weapon once again to aim directly at the creature's head.

Three of these creatures soon advanced on the Spartans position while the final and presumably the leader of these creatures was the first one to actually speak to the Spartan.

With a rough and reptilian voice, the creature said only one word, "…Hunter…"

For a moment the Spartan was confused on what the creature had said, wondering why they had seen him as a hunter of somesort, but these thoughts were dismissed when the threat of these new enemies became very clear.

Two of the creatures lunged toward the Spartan, with a speed that gave this veteran little time to dodge their attacks. When the Spartan regained his stance, he unloaded two full rounds of his battle rifle into one of the creature's skulls, sending it flying into a nearby stone, killing it.

But the second of the two tried to escape the same fate of his friend, but has too slow to evade the Spartan's pinpoint accurate shot into its temple.

The deaths had little effect on the remaining two creature's expressions; the leader of these creatures looked backed and stared at its fellow monster,seminally giving it an order to attack the Spartan, an order that the creature obeyed with no resistance.

But this creature's fate was the same as the others, as it attempted to lunge at the Spartan, he quickly bashed the side of its head with the butt of his rifle, knocking it down to the ground.

This creature stared at the Spartan; its face was broken and blooded from his retaliation to its attack, breaking both flesh and bone. But even with the obvious pain, the only expression in the creature's eyes were defiance, something that the Spartan saw many times before, in the Elites he had fought and killed during the war with the Covenant.

Rage burst though the final creature, enraged with the death of his fellow monsters; it prepared to attack the Spartan itself. The Spartan was surprised when the creature revealed a blade that had been concealed during their entire encounter; it burst from the gauntlet that the creature had sealed to its arm. The beast charged at the Spartan, with a speed that outmatched the others by a long shot, shrieking with an anger that would scare even the most dangerous brute.

The Spartan had to think fast, if he used his rifle to block the creature's attack, it may be damaged or even be destroyed, but he didn't have the time to order Jack to return to his position just so he could get another rifle. But at that moment The Spartan remembered the third weapon he had brought with him on the mission, Rtas's energy sword that he grabbed right before they landed.

The creature was only feet away from the Spartan when he got his grip around the handle of the sword. The creature was about to strike when the sword was activated, a beam of light burst from each side of the handle, as they decreased in brightness, they took the shape that energy swords were known for.

The Beast's blade clashed with the Spartans sword, both showing little to no give. When they clashed again, the creature's blade was cracked, and almost shattered in two. The creature knew that if they clashed again, his would fail and his opponent would break him, so it attempted to escape. But the Spartan wouldn't have it, and gave chase, the monster's speed was great, but it was no match for the inhuman speed of a Spartan.

The Spartan leaped toward the creature in the same way as they had to him, but his attack was successful as he drove his blade into the spine of his enemy, ending its life.

As he rose to his feet and stood over his fallen fore, he wondered about these creatures. They were not an alien species that he'd nor had the UNSC ever encountered, the Elites never even mentioned them ever being in the Covenant so they may never have seen these things either.


	4. Chapter 4: Forces Clash

**Sorry about the Long wait, had some trouble with my computer and lost intrest for some time, but both of those are gone now and we can continue.**

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"Uh sir? What the **Hell **was that!"

The Spartan sighed as he walked toward the rifle he had thrown to the ground, while still griping the blade his friend had given him for this very mission. He finally replied to his shaken pilot after he'd completely checked his weapon, making sure it didn't suffer any damages during the brawl.

"No idea, did you track the ship they came from?"

Jack hesitated for a second, "Uhh….no."

"And why is that? Two unknown ships randomly appear and you don't do jack shit?"

"What? Come on, it's not every day I get to see a Spartan kick some weird alien's ass"

The Spartan sighed, he should have known this would happened, Jack had been stuck in that ship for the whole time with nothing to do, boredom had to set in sooner or later, he just wished it was later.

"Fine, just keep an eye out for more of these damn things."

"Yes Sir, whatever you say" he could not have said that anymore sarcastically,

"And Keep your eyes **off** my optics camera and on your work, understand?"

"Whatever sir…."

The Spartan started back toward his target, Jack meanwhile was transferring the output of the Spartan's optic's camera to every viewing device the Fighter had to offer, just so he could enjoy the show.

"Work? Ya right…all the work I get is watching your metal ass all day."

Jack chuckled to himself, adjusted his chair, and laid back so he could enjoy the show.

"Jack..." the Spartan asked.

"Yes Sir?"

"If you're planning on goofing off, turn the radio off before you say anything **Got it?**"

Jack almost fell out of his chair when he heard that response, he quickly turned to the communication controls of the fighter. His jaw dropped to the floor the second he noticed that the connection to his headset and the Spartan's helmet was still live, and so the Spartan had heard every word he had said.

"Crap….." Jack muttered.

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After about another half hour of walking with no sign of anything or anyone, something finally appeared in the barren plains of this planet. Even from almost a mile away the Spartan could tell it was a crash site, the pitch black smoke saw to that and while he could not tell from whose allegiance this craft belonged to, he could tell that it was no accident.

As the distance between the two of them decreased, the Spartan noticed the craft had a different design. It was a long craft, about twice the size of the previous one, this one had large doors on ether sides that were dented and scorched by the impact. The couch pit was a wreck, the windshield was shattered, and spikes were covering nearly every inch of the interior, with blood adorning the seats.

But that's not caught the Spartan's attention; it was the bodies that lay before him. They were the creatures from before, he could tell from their faces and of course the ship's own design, but that was the only way he knew after seeing the condition of the corpses.

Many looked as if they had been run over by a school bus filled to the brim with hunters, their ribs were shattered, limbs bent in ways that weren't possible, and hell, some had their skulls ripped out of their heads.

Others torn limb from limb, tendons ripped apart, and bones snapped into tiny little pieces. But the worst of them all was the leader of them, wearing massive armor, a headpiece, and of course the blade gauntlet, for he was crucified against the hull of the ship. This slaughter, this massacre, it all had the characteristics, the style of the very creatures he was hunting.

_Brutes…_

But something else caught the Spartan's attention; there was something in one of the creature's hands making a sort of beeping sound. AS he approached whatever it was, he noticed it was something close to a data pad, the kind of devices UNSC officers used to review data. But the device itself wasn't what the Spartan was interested in; it was the picture the device had displayed on it.

It was a small looking creature about the size of a grunt; it had circular body with four razor sharp teeth protruding out of it. Inside it was about this red orbs with nerve spreading throughout its body. And while he couldn't understand the language displayed on the pad, he knew this thing was very important to the creatures that lay dead at his feet.

Before the Spartan put the pad down, he noticed a small indent on its side, as he examined it he found it was a chip, just the size of the UNSC's own standard ones. The moment he removed it, the display of the creature he had examined had vanished and the screen had gone black. He figured it was the devices memory card or at least something like it.

"Jack, I got a question for you."

Jack put down a magazine and replied, "Ya? Wada ya want now?"

The Spartan could tell he was annoyed, but then again he really didn't care.

"I'm sending you some data I found; tell me if you see anything like it."

The Spartan inserted the chip into the slot in the back of his helmet, in an instant the data that had appeared on the pad was inside his helmet, displayed onto his visor.

"Fine, hold on…."

The Spartan waited for his pilots reply, a disturbing feeling arose in his spine, and something about this **thing** was creeping him out.

"Got it, I have no idea what this shit says though."

The Spartan didn't reply, and he didn't care, that thing was something important to whatever these guys were and he had to make sure Jack knew something about them incase anything happens. The Spartan started to walk away from the crash leaving the barbaric remains of the Brutes actions behind him.

"Uh Sir..."

The Spartan stopped, "Yes?"

"What the **Hell** is this thing? It looks like a jelly fish crossed with a pair of Teeth?"

After a few more minutes of walking, the Spartan noticed something in the distance; at first he thought it was another crash site. But the closer he got the more he noticed it was something far different, it was moving.

As it grew closer to his position, he finally was able to make out what it was. It was a large group of creatures; all of them were at least eight feet tall. They wore large plated armor, more crude than the Spartan's but if looked effective. The weapons they carried were barbaric in nature, mere explosive and projectile with crude jagged blades attached to them, the very nature that spawned their names, Brutes.

Their leader was verily the same size, about one or two feet larger. His armor was more detailed, more advanced compared to all the others. And his weapon, a large metallic hammer with a curved blade attached to the back. As he approached where the Spartan had taken refuge, he commanded the beasts that followed him to stop, with one approaching him and asked.

"Pack Leader, Why do we stop?"

Ha planted his hammer into the ground and replied, "Do you smell that…Something **Stinks!**"

He picked his hammer up and roared, "FIND IT, NOW!"

The Pack spread out in every direction crushing stones, ripping holes in the ground, anything to find the source of that smell. The leader, followed by at least two of the pack were approaching the Spartan, the rock he used as cover would soon become less than a pile of pebbles to the force of the brute. The Spartan decided it was time to make his move; he slowly removed the shotgun from his back and placed his rifle in its place.

The Beast grew closer and closer to the Spartan, hell the Spartan could smell the damn brute's terrible breath from there. The Brute stopped less than a foot away from the rock, he gripped his hammer his both of his massive claws and raised it far above his head, preparing to strike the stone with all of its force.

But that's when the Spartan sprang to action; he jumped from the stone, and gave the monster no time to react as he aimed his shotgun at the Brute's massive temple of a head.

"DEMON!" The Beast roared.

"No Shit"

And with that the Spartan pulled the trigger, not even the brute's armor, shield or thick skull could save him from the impact of a Soellkraft 8-Gauge Shell at close quarters. The Brute fell backwards, the grip on his weapon shattered at the same moment as his skull, and as his body crashed o the ground, the rest of the pack turned to stare right at the Spartan, who just smiled as he cocked his weapon.

"So…..who's next?" The Spartan tempted them.

They all roared as they took in his remark, cursing the Spartan.

"Tear him to Bits!"

"Feast on His Flesh!"

"I'll tear out your Spine!"

But one of them took up the leaders hammer, his golden armor may not have been as advanced as the leaders, but it was superior to the others. He took the lead and commanded his brothers as if he was the chieftain, rage filled his ugly, hairy, disfigured face as he pointed the hammer at the Spartan and said.

"For our lords….**RIP** **HIM TO SHREDS**!"

The beasts rushed the Spartan, weapons primed and ready to nail their "Demon" to the ground with a hail of spikes, explosives, and of course a painful beating from the new top dog's hammer. But this _Demon _was ready, with his weapon loaded and grenade in his palm, he waited till they were in range to start blowing them to hell.

But something happened, a straight piercing noise bursting though the air. It was as if there was a lion scratching its claws against the roughest chalkboard imaginable while next to the worlds loudest speaker system, many of the brutes stopped their charge in order to cover their ears to protect themselves from the noise. Only the Spartan and the leader didn't budge, their wills were strong but the noise bothered them too, the Brute's face seemed irritated.

And the Spartan? His eye twitched.

The noise soon disappeared as quickly as it came, but something arrived in its place. Three ships roared though the sky, clearly by the looks on the Packs faces they weren't Covenant.

But the Spartan did recognize these crafts; they were the same kind of crafts as the one he found crashed a few hundred yards back. The doors on the sides of these ships opened, and of course, the creatures from before, the ones that had attacked him and been slaughtered by the Brutes exited each ship. They carried a kind of beam rifles, shields, and of course the blades the Spartan recognized far too well.

There were at least twenty of them, all welding various weapons, but one stood at the lead of these monsters; his armor was a massive barrage of steel and metal along with a glowing frame that consumed its entire body. It was almost twice the size of the other creatures, and carried a fairly large blade that extended from its fore arm.

As these creatures closed in on the pack and Spartan alike, the brutes turned to the creatures with weapons in hand, preparing for battle and completely forgetting about the "Demon" they were cursing at mere moments ago.

Even the new leader of the pack turned from the Spartan. He soon turned back to the Spartan; the rage in his eyes was still burning and conflicted on whether to attack the demon or the creatures that had interrupted them. The beast suddenly swung his weapon toward the Spartan, shattering the stone that stood as the only barrier between the two.

He turned to his brothers, "Crush these insects! The Demon is **MINE**!"

The pack suddenly burst into an inferno of rage, they began chaotically rushing their enemies, firing their weapons like crazed animals and even attempting to tear them apart, limb by limb. All at this time the creatures with no reasoning behind their sudden arrival returned fire with equal savage nature, pouncing into the air, defending with their shields and combating the brutes with blades of fury.

The Spartan meanwhile stood his ground against the massive behemoth, dodging blows from its destructive weapon and trying to return fire. He found this to be particularly difficult to accomplish, the brute's attacks were chaotic and uncontrollable, something the Spartan found difficult to predict and counter.

But as the war between the Brutes, Creatures, and the lone Spartan raged onward, none seemed to notice an armored figure approach the warzone from afar.


	5. Chapter 5: The Two Hunters

**Review if you would, they would be very appreciated.**

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The Spartan ducked out of the way, the Brute's attacks were going more inpatient and frustrating. The fighting between the two imposing forces were getting nowhere fast, just like the ongoing battle between the brute's pack and these creatures who appeared out of nowhere. The monsters were fighting against the massive retaliation caused by the brute's own onslaught. They were quick, they were aggressive, and they were pissed.

But the Spartan didn't have time to concern himself with these strange creatures; his mind was focused on the brute trying to pound his skull into a pile of ash.

Piles of craters soon littered the ground, each caused by a failed attempt on the Spartan's life, who felt that maybe close quarters combat with a hammer crazed brute may not be the best idea. As he dived out of the way of another strike, he saw a nearby structure that may become his salvation.

_Well, monkeys and big buildings… I've seen worse combos._

He quickly primed a grenade he snacked from a nearby brute's corpse and tossed it at his opponent. The brute was far too pissed to consider the grenade as a threat, he mealy swag his hammer and crushed the grenade. The impact from the hammer caused the grenade to explode, creating a massive blue cloud of plasma that engulfed the brute blinding him in the process and burning his armor.

The Spartan took this as his chance and dashed in the direction of the structure he noticed before. But as he did, he saw the carnage erupting around. These monsters engaging were still facing off against each other, Brutes ripping at these creatures with all their fury while the creatures themselves were acting as if they were savage beasts as well.

The Spartans saw bits and pieces of such battles. Such as a Brute knocking a creature to the ground, as it put its foot against the creature's head; both of its hands gripped the creature's forearms and pulled. The Creature's face was engulfed in pain, it's screaming ravaging the air, all happening as its arms were torn from its sockets by the brute, tendons snapping, bones cracking and shattering from the strain, and the Brute? Well it just stood there, it raised the creature's limbs in the air mocking the creature before finally beating its fallen fore with its own arm.

But the Brute's weren't having all the fun; these creatures were fighting with rage all they're own. The Spartan saw one the creatures, nearly the same size as a brute, holding one by the neck lifting it into the air with a single arm as if it was effortless. A crooked grin or at least from what the Spartan could tell was a grin appeared across its face as it readied the blade that adorned its arm.

Its eyes seemed sadistic, crazed, like a madman's as it plunged its weapon into the brutes armor, ripping and tearing though it to get to the brutes flesh. It finally burst into laughter, it sounded like nothing the Spartan ever heard before as it ripped its blade though the brute, tearing like a knife though construction paper until it finally reached the neck and lopped its head clean off.

The Spartan just continued to run ignoring these overly increasing acts of violence and torment, focusing on the structure that was still a distance away, and the ever charging and furious brute behind him.

But then he saw something in his path, not a brute and not one of these creatures, but something far different than these barbaric and enraged monsters. It stood nearly the same height as the Spartan, orange armor covering every inch of whoever was, wearing a crimson helmet. The figure appeared to stand apart from the struggle, but bodies of these strange creatures laid behind it, scorched from a impact of some sort.

_What the hell..._

The figure raised its right arm and pointed it in the Spartan's direction, that's when the Spartan realized entire arm until the elbow had been replaced by a type of cannon. It soon fired; a fairly large projectile of energy came hurdling toward the Spartan, giving him very little time to dodge it.

But at that moment, the Spartan saw the projectile wiz past his head, completely missing him. And in a split second, the Spartan turned to see the projectile hit his pursuer square in the chest, and while it did not severely damage his armor, it did knock him back a few yard, giving the Spartan some much needed breathing room.

Without missing a beat, the Spartan switched to his rifle and pointed it toward the figure before him, friend or foe; to him it didn't matter to him until he knew who's side it was on is.

The figure just stood there, until it suddenly spoke.

"What are yo…."

It was cut short by a burst from the Spartan's rifle flashing by its head. As it turned, it saw one of the creatures standing less than a few meters away with a hole through its head, oozing blood before finally dropping to the ground, dead.

As the figure turned back to face the Spartan, he spoke,

"Identify yourself! Who are you and what are you doing here?"

But the figure just stood its ground, its weapon ready to fire as it replied to the Spartan's command.

"What? I just saved you! And you question me like an enemy?"

The two warriors just stood there, focusing on the person in their path, awaiting a response. But their patience was shattered as a brute's corpse dropped between the two of them.

The Spartan looked back to his previous opponent and saw it once again charging him, but let's say that him being pissed was now a major understatement.

"Uh…maybe we should continue this at a better time." The Spartan recommended.

The Spartan started toward the structure once again, but this time he was accompanied by the strange armored figure, following only shortly behind him. As they nearly reached the outskirts of the battle, they were stopped cold by a massive roar originating from only a few yards behind them.

A massive brute, heavily armored, holding both a massive metallic hammer as well as a corpse of a heavily bloodied creature in its claws. Rage filled its eyes, apparently seeing his prey escape him twice and being attacked by an own known assailant didn't go that well with his morals.

AS he lunged toward his armored prey, they dived out of his path to reveal three creatures in their path, two stood bloodied and beaten by the pack. But the third, commanding its fellow creature's with a iron fist of fear and fury, trying to cut off these two before being mistakenly struck by the full force of the brutes weapon.

Its armor shattered, eyes went pale, and blood burst from its wounds as the sheer force of the weapon sent it flying several feet in the air before crashing to the ground, dead. After witnessing this, the remaining creatures drew their blades and leaped toward the brute, wanting to avenge their fallen commander with their lives.

The two armored assailants watched in awe, their common foes trying to kill each other while they both were just meters away from them. But once the Brute smashed one of the remaining creatures over the head with its hammer, the two saw this as their cue and processed to escape the raging monsters and disappear among the stone structures ahead of them.

The Spartan peered around a section of the Structure he and his new acutance had choicen to rest in while their common enemies battled each other. As he looked on, he could still see the battle raging on, the explosions still visible from this distance but he could not tell which faction had taken the lead in their struggle.

He soon turned back with the certainty that none of the two forces were following them, only to see the green barrel of a certain cannon being aimed toward his face.

"Seeing how you not with ether of them, Tell me who are you and what are you doing here?"

The figure, clearly female from her voice, something the Spartan didn't really notice from their last "conversation" stood aiming her weapon, clearly wanting some answers. But what she didn't see was that the Spartan wasn't as slow witted as the brutes as she assumed he was.

The Spartan had not only known of her intension, but he had also drawn his weapon and had it positioned clearly aimed at her waist. Once she had realized her position in their little "meeting", the Spartan slowly and clearly replied to her question.

"How about we put the weapons down and I'll tell you."

The Spartan slowly lowered his weapon and as if it was on cue, the cannon was too slowly removed from the Spartan's personal space. The Spartan laid his weapon against a neighboring wall and took a seat on a stone lying conveniently nearby. And while his "guest" remained standing, the Spartan desisted to start their conversation himself.

"I'm Spartan 048 of the United Nation Space Command Defense Force."

The Spartan stared at the person before him, awaiting a response from the answer he had given here, but let's say the response he got wasn't the one he expected.

"And what the hell is that?"

"Excuse me?" The Spartan said with a confused tone.

"I have no idea what you're talking about; let alone what this UNSC-thing is."

"Ok then…..how about telling me about whom **you **are then?" The Spartan didn't really know how to respond.

"I'm Samus Aran, bounty hunter in the employ of the Galactic Federation."

It was her turn for a response, Samus knew many in the galaxy feared the even mention of her name, but even she didn't expect the armored man's answer at all.

"Well, you lost me at bounty hunter."

"What!" She burst out, nearly doing a face-plant like it was out of a bad cartoon or something.

"You're a bounty hunter that I get, but for who you are and who you work for...no idea"

Samus was beside herself, for most of her carrier almost the entire galaxy knew of her exploits, let alone the Alliance. But somehow this person before her knew nothing of ether of them.

"Ok then...how about you explain what exactly what you or your organization is."

The Spartan stood from his seat and began to explain what he and the UNSC were.

"The UNSC is the main military force of the human race from where I came from."

"I am part of their Spartan II program, a program to train people from a young age to become deadly."

"From a young age? How young?" Samus asked curiously.

"About six years I think."

Samus just stood there, and while the Spartan couldn't see it, her face was struck by memories from her past. Memories from her time on Zebes, everything that had happened to her at that age onward pleasant or not, she tried to hide this from her guest as he continued.

"We fought in a massive war against a coalition of aliens known as the Covenant."

Samus pounded the Spartan's tale with uncertainty; throughout her exploits in the galaxy she had never been given any knowledge of a covenant of creatures of such density.

"They were hell-bent on the destruction of the human race, glassing anywhere we where and killing billions."

"That's impossible! The alliance had no knowledge of such actions and how come I never heard of this?" Samus nearly screamed.

The Spartan turned in disbelief, "What? The Covenant had tried to kill us all; they almost glassed the earth to dust!"

"If that is true, why are you here in Alliance territory and not at Earth?"

"Alliance territory? At the edge of the universe?"

Samus just stood there, confused by the Spartans comment.

"What do you mean the edge of the universe? I have no idea what you're talking about."

The Spartan was starting to get a headache; this person was describing not only a universe completely free of the Covenant but was also completely unaware of both the Covenant and UNSC alike.

"Well than…lets change roles then, who are you and what this alliance you're talking about?"

"Ok then, the Alliance is a formation of many of the universe's races that govern most of the galaxy."

The Spartan chuckled, "Sound like the Covenant, but less stupid homicidal region and grunts."

Samus was dumbfounded for a moment," Wait what?"

"Oh a grunt? It's just some annoying tiny cannon fodder used by…"

"No no, the religion thing." She intervened.

"Oh, the entire Covenant was formed for the idea that an ancient race called the Forerunners was gods."

"Ok then, how's that homicidal?"

"Their main goal was to activate an ancient system to make them "Gods", but really it would just kill everything."

"Ev….Everything?" Samus shuttered in response.

"Yep…so what about you being a bounty hunter?" The Spartan tried to change the subject.

"Oh…I'm hired by the Alliance to hunt down space pirates and other things."

The Spartan was starting to think this was a joke, space pirates, galactic alliance, and whatever. Trying to hold in the laughter was becoming an almost unbearable task.

"Space Pirates? Are you joking?"

The look of confusion was starting to become a trademark upon Samus's face as he spoke.

"No…You met them already, they were fighting those ape things."

And at that moment it happened, for the first time in a long time, the Spartan burst out laughing.

"That's what they're called! Man that's pathetic."

The bounty hunters expression became much more serious as she heard this; she apparently didn't feel the same way.

"That's not funny." She shouted.

"Ok ok…Sorry I didn't mean to piss you off." The Spartan apologized.

"I've just thought they were these powerful warriors and now that I know their names they seem alittle..."

The Spartan then noticed something on his radar, a massive figure flashed over it. A huge creature flew overhead with unbelieveable speed, seemingly making banshees seem slow as a duck. But just as it had appeared, it disappeared in less than a second leaving nothing but a dark imprint in his mind. Samus soon noticed this and asked the Spartan what was amiss.

"What is it?"

The Spartan turned to her and replied, "Nothing..."


	6. Chapter 6: A Discovery

**Please Review, they will be appreciated**

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The Spartan soon grew bored with their conversation of purely questions and answers. As stood from his seat and strolled toward one of the walls this structure was comprised of, his guest just stared at him, still pondering on who this man was exactly.

"What's your name?" She asked wanting a real name, not the title he had given her.

The Spartan looked out into the fields, clearly ignoring her question. As he readied his rifle, he looked over a small crack in the otherwise sturdy wall, observing the battle the two had taken leave from.

A sudden chuckle turned Samus's attention away from her weapon, which she had been cleaning while she had been awaiting his response. As she looked toward the Spartan, he had placed his rifle against the wall and was clearly enjoying the view. With another small chuckle, the Spartan returned the glaze she had given and spoke again.

"Looks like your pirate pals are getting their asses kicked."

With this revelation, the hunter's interest was peeked. She slowly rose from her seat and processed to the Spartan's side, eager to see what this who was kicking who's ass. As she finally peered over the wall, she something that filled her with both joy and intense fear. For less than a mile away, apawn the battlefield these two had been treading on less than an half an hour ago laid the bodies of countless space pirates and brutes. But those who were still standing was those she least suspected for many brutes still stood their ground, doing almost unspeakable things to the pirates corpses as they roared in sound victory.

The brutes just continued to enjoy the pleasures of their victory, namely the feast they were making from the pirate's corpses as three ships soon soared overhead. These Phantoms floated over the battlefield and dropped off what Samus expected to be a cleanup crew. These crews were made of very small creatures; they wore a small set of armor that covered only the chests along with a large tank and a sort of gas mask that covered their face. They were nothing like the brutes they appeared to serve; they were meek, scared, and spineless as they retrieved the remaining corpses that still had no teeth marks in them.

As they were bulled by the brutes while making their way back toward the ships, Samus spied a all too familiar figure standing atop a fairly large bolder in the center of the battlefield.

Standing apawn the bolder was a very large brute holding a very large hammer and was covered in gold plated armor, although he had done battle with both of them and even took a full charged shot from her power beam, he only had a fairly small scorch mark on his abdomen. But of course after everything she had faced in the universe the chance of this creature surviving was no surprise to her , but what was a surprise is what it was gripping. For in its hand was the heavily dented, broken, and bloody remains of a once heavily armored space pirate. The very same one who tried to stop them from leaving the battle in the first place, of course she remembered it from then before it had an unwelcomed encounter with this brute. Now it simply looked like a dented scrap of metal covering a torn shred of meat being held by a huge ape in armor.

"Damn.." She looked toward the Spartan, "They don't like taking prisoners do they?"

The Spartan turned back to her and shrugged, "Meh, not unless they ran out of grunts to eat."

He soon pushed of the wall and picked up his rifle before returning to his seat. Samus just continued to watch the brutes clean up for a few more minutes before deciding to continue their little questionnaire.

"Soo...why are you here?"

He just looked towards the wall and pointed at the brutes, "Them."

Samus had figured that, strange creatures, strange man, she could put those two pieces together, she had hoped to find out something else, something **other** than the bare facts.

_Well no shit, tell me something I don't know._

Bored as she could possibly be, Samus turned back to the man she questioned, who was occupied with something with the determination to get some real answers from the so called Spartan. She sat a mear foot from the man before finally turning to him, preparing to tell him her reason for being on this god forsaken planet, only to be interrupted by said person pulling out a pair of devices she didn't expect.

In his hands were both a data paid and memory chip, both that belonged to the space pirates.

"Where did you..." She started, but stopped while observing the mans actions.

He soon inserted the chip into the far side of the data pad. The moment this happened the screen of said device flashed alive, displaying a wide assortment of information in the pirates native tongue, which she could tell this man couldn't understand a stand of it. Samus tried to hold in a small chuckle as he flipped though the images, she could tell that this man has had no knowledge of this technology or even the creatures he was looking at. She could even swear she heard him counting off every time he had pasted another picture while he was searching. It took nearly a few minutes until it seemed he had finally located the image he had been searching for.

"Tell me, have you seen this **thing **before?" he said to her, completely unaware of the startled expression beneath her helmet.

"That's...A Metroid" she stuttered, surprised to see his interest in that specific creature.

"AH so that's what that jellyfish thing is named!" screamed a random voice from the Spartan's helmet, surprising Samus while greatly annoying the Spartan.

The Spartan quickly reached the comm switch that adorned his helmet, while a confused Samus just looked onward.

"Jack, What aren't you working?" he asked, clearly not amused with this sudden outburst.

"WhaT! I am! You told me to watch out for that thing." Jack said, still trying delay the ass kicking the Spartan was going to give him.

The Spartan just sighed and just smacked himself in the helmet, just outright annoyed by his pilot's blatant disregard of his orders. It wasn't until he noticed the confusion Samus had did he decide to introduce her to his _friend._

"This annoying son of a bitch is my pilot, Jack." He finally said with a _Hello! _following.

Know that she knew the identity of the strange eavesdropping; Samus focused herself back on the Metroid, snatching the data pad out of the Spartans hands and examining it further. She was dumbfounded, she hadn't seen a single Metroid since her mission to SR388 and then suddenly she finds a strange man hold a space pirate's data pad with its image, all of this helped her tone out the Spartan's and jack's conversation.

"Soo...who's the girl?" Jack said with a grin, causing Samus's eyebrow to twitch in clear annoyance.

"Her name is Samus, now Jack are you here to annoy me or is there a purpose?"The Spartan scowled, still annoyed by his friends presence.

Jack's grin grew just by the possibility of being there to just annoy the Spartan, but it shrunk the moment he realized the massive beating he'd get if that happened.

"No...I'm here to ask you something..." he said, trying to change the subject.

"Then what is it? You're wasting time."

"I have the exact location of the brute's carrier; I also saw them with those Metroid things too."

Jack had hoped this new bit of inf was enough to make the Spartan forget about him eavesdropping. Lucky for him it did not only catch not only the Spartan's attention, but Samus's as well. Even with the urge to gloat on how he came by this info, he quickly transferred the location to the Spartans systems via a navigation point and closed the comm. channel. He figured he'd already made his friend pissed enough at him for one day's work, and maybe try to get off the day with only a small beating from his superior. But as he switched back to the ships main console, where he kept hi personal recording of the ships data recordings, he noticed something fairly large fly past the ships motion sensor.

The moment the Spartan received the nav point on his visor he lifted his rifle and checked his current clip, making sure he was ready for a fight. But as he stood up from the stone he noticed Samus as well, it didn't take him but a moment to figure that his mission wasn't as solo as he thought it would be.

"I'm coming with you." was her only response to all of this, he figured as much.

He knew he could try talking her out of this, but he kinda figured that it would be as hard as trying to get a Elephant to go up a steep hill, some things are too stubborn for their own good. He sighed and only shrugged, how could he complain one more gun would only make his mission easier, and hell she fight about as good as any Spartan he knew of, well almost any.

The two soon made their way towards a set of rocky looking stone stairs, they had figured since their new destination was going this direction, why not go though the temple instead of going around it? At least there would be far less of a chance to run into the Brutes or Space pirates this way.

But as if it was fate itself, less than three steps down the large flight of stairs an annoying voice burst though the Spartan's speakers, destroying the silence both of these hunters were quite enjoying.

"Uh sir? I've got another question." Jack muttered in a frantically.

The Spartan fought back the urge to just cut communications as he replied, "What now Jack?"

Jack's tone quickly changed from mear frantic to downright scared shitless, "Uh ya...Have either of you seen any giant animals yet?"

Something now worried the Spartan; Jack wasn't even spooked by something like a Scarab, what could scare him like this? Samus seemed concerned as well, she knew something was off with Jack as well, but something else concerned her as well.

"Um...No jack, I haven't at least...why?" He replied, trying to calm Jack down abit.

"Well...um do you have any advice on a giant pterodactyl with lifeless, cold yellow eyes...?"

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**Look who's here...if you can't figure out who I mean than you've obviously never played a Metroid game in your life.**

**Note: for any further reference, this Fic takes place after Halo 3 and during Super Metroid...but with a few new surprises.**

**Oh and if anyone's mad at the asskicking the Pirates were handed, don't worry they'll have some payback later on.**


	7. Chapter 7: Dragon hunters

Hello there everyone, I'm dearly sorry for the lack of updates for this story, my god its been about what? Six months? Good god I'm a complete bastard for making all the fans of this story wait for so long, But I'm back to say that before this month is over I will release yet another Chapter and try to update BOTH of my story on a much more clear basis.

Oh and sorry if Ridley and Samus are alittle OOC in this Chapter, I really wanted to give Ridley a personality other than a monstrous beast, and well the punishment he gets kinda causes the outcome below, and for Samus, seeing your arch Nemesis get a major crap beaten out of them...well you'll see.

Now lets get on with the story.

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Checking the safety, Jack returned his finger to his assault rifle's trigger, slowly and carefully scanning the windshield.

His eyes were twitching as sweat dripped down his face and blood even dripped from his hands as he held his rifle far too tightly. It had been five minutes since he saw the monstrosity that landed only a few yards from his ship and only three since he called the local Spartan with the news. Glancing back and forth, Jack could only wait for the creature to appear once again, being a former ODST, Jack was ready to act on a moments notice...not that it helped that this 'thing' scared the unholy crap out of him.

Growing impatient, he slowly let his hand leave the grip, being ready to return it there if the creature returned, he flipped the switch for the local com link.

"Spartan...would you mind picking up the pace alittle bit?...getting kinda creepy here." he said nervously.

While there was considerably more static this time around. he was somewhat relived when he got a response.

"Understood, we are on our way, ETA in..." the Spartan started, but Jack stopped listening as fear struck him when a loud thud was heard on top of the ship.

His eye slowly focused on the upper center of the windshield, where there was once a clear view of the open landscape nad ruins that littered the landing site was now replaced with the sickly view of two blood shot, hateful yellow eyes.

**"Hello meatbag..." **it spoke in a dark raspy voice, thankfully the air tight windshield protected Jack from its terrible bad breath.

With his rifle's sight pointed directly between the creature's forehead, Jack could only sweat bullets as one thing entered his mind_...Ugly as HELL_!

**"Whats the matte meatbag? Metroid got your tongue?"**

Jack could only flinch as he pulled the trigger, unleashing a hail of bullets onto the beast, shattering the windshield in the process. Clenching his eyes shut, Jack fired nonstop until all he could hear was the constant cliches of an empty assault rifle. Quickly dropping the empty clip and popping in a fresh one, he glanced towards the now shattered windshield with his rifle in hand, prepared to engage the beast yet again. But as he tried to once again contact his friend via the COM system, he failed to notice a fairly large reptilian fist slowly descend from the top of the ship.

**"Peak a Boo! I KILL YOU!"**

And without another word, the massive fist burst through the destroyed windshield, slamming into Jack and sent him flying across the ship's interior towards the storage lockers. As Jack regained his barrings, he noticed the massive hand of the beast reaching into the cockpit and smashing everything in sight, witch included Jack's custom pilot seat he had installed when the Elites were doing upgrades to the ship.

Enraged by his precious chairs destruction, Jack grabbed the nearest weapon, which happened to be a shotgun.

"You Son of a Bitch! You have any IDEA how long it took me to break that in?" Jack screamed before firing off a few shots at the beast, which only grazed its skin in the slightest.

Jack stared back at the creature, its skin barley even scuffed from the shotgun shells. It chuckled in response of Jack's tempered fueled attack and opened its massive jaw, while Jack on the other hand was still trying to gather some shells from the broken supply locker he had crashed into. But as he readied his newly reloaded shotgun back at the beast, he paled at the sight of a source of fire burning at the back of it's throat.

**"Oh well...I'll guess I'm haven Barbecue tonight!"**

With a torment of fire about to collide with his poor cowboy hat wearing self, Jack slammed his eyes shut in await the incoming pain. But after a few minutes, Jack noticed there was no feeling of burning pain on his face, much to his relief. He gazed soon returned to the thing that _was _supposed to be burning him into ashes by now had a bleeding on his cheek along with a burning scorch mark.

The Beast slowly turned towards its new source of pain and 'fun' with a scowl, or at least what anyone could guess was a scowl on its face. When its eyes finally rested on the new targets, he saw a fairly familiar sight, a heavily armored figure pointing a large cannon attached to its arm at its face.

**"Samus! What a surprise! You here to interrupt my cookout?..." **it then notice the other figure next to her, **"And who's your friend?...a reject from the Feds?" **it chuckled.

The Spartan stepped forward, his finger twitching on his rifles trigger, "Nah, I'm not with the Federation." he then picked a blue plasma grenade from his belt.

"But that piece of meat your about to cook it my pilot, and _'priming the grenade'_ I'm the only one who gets to beat on him."

The toss was quick, so quick that neither the beast or Jack could notice, but the dragon finally noticed a small, blue pulsating device attached to his left eye. But before he could pluck the werid looking thing from it's eye, it exploded in a flash of plasma, leaving a grinning Spartan and a surly pissed off dragon. As the smoke from the blast disappeared it reveled the damage the grenade caused to the beast, not only was the unfortunate eye completely melted, but the flesh around the blast sight was burned down to the bone marrow...which was smoking from the plasma.

**"AGH, What the hell was that!" **it screamed with rage, its right hand still holding onto the remains of its once fearsome yellow eye.

All he got for a response was another volley of missiles from Samus, successfully knocking him off the ships hull.

"Hey" The Spartan turned towards the bounty hunter, "Go check on your friend, I got this lizard " **'HEY!' **" hes not going anywhere."

"You sure?" He then glanced toward the fuming dragon, "He seems pretty annoying to fight."

Samus chuckled, "Not really, I killed him atleast twice already."

"What?" the Spartan asked, confused.

"Just go," She the rushed toward the behemoth before them, "I'll explain later."

The Spartan didn't press the matter further and took off toward the ship, leaving Samusto engage the creature. He rushed toward the access ramp and activation, impatiently waiting for it to open before he rushed inside. Noticing Jack siting on the floor near a heavily dented locker, he grabbed a med kit before kneeling beside his wounded friend.

"Heh, took you long enough to get here...where's lizard lips?" Jack chuckled to himself, despite the pressure the Spartan was putting on his injured arm.

"Well deal with it," The Spartan the n looked towards the cockpit, "Whats the damage?"

Jack scowled, "Bastard busted the wind sheild and my chair...fucktard." That last statement made the Spartan chuckle.

Sealing the gash with a piece of medical tape, the Spartan stood up and turned to the ramp. "I'll send him the bill when hes in hell buddy."

"Wait." The Spartan stopped and turned towards his friend, who in turn held something out to the Spartan with a grin. "I think you'll need this dumbass."

Beneath his helmet, there was a smirk on the Spartan's face.

'Back with Samus and Ridley'

Dodging another swipe from the dragon, Samus aimed her cannon at her rivals head and fired another super missile, which like the rest, was blocked by one of the dragon's wings. She snarled at her enemy and took off in a dash, dodging even more of the tail swipes he was sending her way. While charging her weapon, Samus could not wonder what new tricks Ridley would have for her this time around.

Around the time her Spartan ally went to check on his friend, she noticed something new about her old buddy Ridley, for other than having one of his eyes blown to bits by a grenade, he had multiple metallic implants that covered his body. His tail was covered in a large platinum spike, his claws also had large spiked knuckle guards along with razor shard steal claws, and his chest was covered in sliver plated armor, making it a pain in the ass to get a direct hit to his chest. But as Samus was thinking this over, she didn't notice the compartments on Ridley's shoulder pads open up and reveal six missile launcher, that fire directly at her.

"Shit" She swore before rolling out of the way of one and blasting the other five out of the way with her plasma beam.

Swinging her arm around, she took aim at Ridley, or atleast attempted to, seeing how he was no longer there. Scanning the area, she notice a fairly large dragon shaped shadow about and looked up and fired her missiles. But they only caused some minor imprints as Ridley crashed down upon her, grabbing her with his massive claws and tossed her into some of the ruins around the battlefield.

"Well...fuck" she swore again, now seeing her massive opponent striding towards her location, a huge grind on its scaly face.

**"Well Samus you know what they say..."**he starts cracking his knuckles, **"Paybacks a bitch...Bitch!"**

Samus stated to wince as the massive spiked fist came rushing toward her, but out of the corner of her eye she noticed a small laser moving on Ridley's chest. But within a moment of noticing it, the small laser that seemed to be no bigger than a bean turn into a gigantic beam that burst through not only Ridley's armor but his body itself, bursting through his back.

**"AgHH WHAT the HELL!" **Ridley screamed, somehow still alive even with a massive gaping hole in his chest. As he staggered back a few steps, he felt something round under his foot, as he looked down trying to keep his single eye away from the hole and saw a small round sphere.

He was confused by it for a moment until he saw it start to beep and flash red multiple times until it hit him, he then slowly turned to the now grinning Samus and said one thing only.

**"I Hate You."**

And then in an instant, a massive explosion engulfed the dragon, making Samus rush for cover. Once she was safely behind a fairly large stone pillar, she watched the cloud of smoke rise up from the area and a coal colored dragon step out, its body burned nearly to the bone. The effects of her power bomb did its job alright.

**"Fu...ck...you..B..oth" **it whizzed, a few holes were torn in his throat during the explosion.

The Spartan, who was now hold a giant smoking green laser cannon walked over to the bounty hunter as they gazed at the enormous amount of pain they caused this annoying creature, but their thoughts were cut short by a loud scream.

"NO!" All three of them looked toward the damaged Longsword and saw it pilot, Jack standing to its side with a rocket launcher in hand, "Fuck you."

Two rockets blew through the air after leaving the launcher's tubes and raced towards their target, a wide-eyed dragon named Ridley.

**"Well...Shit." **

The combined explosion of the rockets sent Ridley back a few more steps, making him crash into yet another pile of ruins, which unfortunately for him (and fortunate for everyone else, and funny too) had a shallow floor that gave-way under the stress of the dragon's body. And with a small 'eep' coming from the beast's mouth, he went tumbling down the tunnel screaming all the way down.

The two armored solders slowly walked towards the hole and stared into it, their weapons up and ready incase their enemy came flying out of the tunnel. After a few minates of silence (and a few rocks thrown) both of them let out a sigh of relief.

"So...you think hes dead?" the Spartan asked.

"Doubt it, that jackass has been through worse." Samus shrugged.

The two continued to gaze into the dark tunnel until they heared the faint sound of footsteps behind them, they turned to see Jack, his arm still bandaged, holding not only the rocket launcher from eailer but also a fairly large device.

"Is the Bastard dead yet? I wanted to carve a new leather chair out of his hide." he asked.

The Spartan shrugged, "Don't know" he pointed to the tunnel, "fell down this hole."

"Damn..." Jack replied, his scowl still in place before setting his launcher aside.

Pressing a few buttons on the tip of the ball like device, it began to beep before he tossed it too into the tunnel. With the two armored friends looking at him in confusion, Jack simply picked up his weapon and started to walk back to the ship, albert in a quicker pace than before. The two then set their gaze on the tunnel yet again, looking into it's darkness before they heard a faint yet noticeable, **"Ow"**.

With the sound of the beeping getting louder, the Spartan looked towards his friend, "What was that?".

Jack simply smirked, letting his eyes gaze at the tunnel, "Lets see him survive that."

And as if god had demanded it, a massive explosion was heard at the base of the tunnel and fire burst through the top, setting Jack off in a massive laugh fit when a massive groan came out of the tunnel.

**"You're all bastards, you know that."**

Gripping his rifle, The Spartan turned towards his old friend , who was trying (with no success by the way) to surpress the laughing fit he was having. Looking at the damaged Longsword and back towards Jack, he decided to get some useful answers.

"Can you fix it?" he asked glancing towards the ship.

Jack shrugged, "Ya, with the extra supplies we got, but it'll take a day or two...expect for my friggen chair."

The Spartan patted him on the shoulder, "I'll buy you a new one when we get home."

Jack only nodded in response, noticing an armored bounty hunter walking slowly toward them. The Spartan looked at Jack in confusion until he noticed Samus and picked Jack up from his pout like mood.

"Samus, This is my good for nothing pilot," making a guesture towards his friend, "Jack."

She nodedat his introduction. She was weary of this cowboy hat wearing loud mouth at first, but hey, if this guy could blast Ridley into a deep tunnel and drop a bomb on him he couldn't be all bad right?

"Now," Jack asked, while adjusting his hat, "Can someone please explain what the hell is going on here?"

* * *

And there we go, I'm still sorry about the long wait everyboyd, I promise I'll update this one more time before this month is over and get in a more understandable updating schedule.

But before I go, can you guys go to my profile and vote on my next big story, I need votes on that thing before I decide, But thanks and I'll see you guys later.


	8. Chapter 8: Of Metroids and Killcounts

Hello again everybody.

Here we go, now sorry for the small chapter, I just had to make one explaining the Metroids to the Halo characters, I may have to do the same with the Flood later on (yes there will be Flood in this story, but not for awhile longer).

* * *

Hours, it took three freaking hours to explain everything to Jack, and even then he couldn't understand half of what he was told. He wasn't even paying attention for the first thirty minutes until the Spartan gave a hard smack to the side of his head to get his attention back on track. With another two and an half hours of explaining (yet another half an hour was wasted, only this time because Jack was morning his chair again), the conversation finally reached its limit.

"Bullshit, that's complete bullshit."

Apparently the conversation had reached Metroids, and well...lets say Jack's response was less then they had hoped.

"She's telling the truth." The Spartan replied, rummaging through the busted locker (a locker that had a fairly big imprint that looked similar to Jack's head) for anything still useble.

Jack just gave him a deadpan look, "Really?" Jack then started to press a few buttons and made a picture of a Metroid appear on a screen.

"That jellyfish-like THING could wipe out a battalion of brutes?, I find that hard to believe."

Samus nodded, leaving Jack to only cross his arms in frustration, still refusing to believe that something smaller than a grunt could be more dangerous than a steroid overdosed, energy sword wielding, raging elite zealot. A few moments pasted in complete silence, until Samus finally shattered it with an idea.

"I could show you." there was alittle hesitation in her voice though.

This new development caused Jack to lift his head in interest, while the Spartan just glanced back at the two for a moment before returning to his quest for a new energy battery for the Spartan laser.

Samus then pointed to one of the mobile computer sets (1) Jack had near the supply lockers. Jack quickly walked over to them and snatched one before walking back over to Samus and giving it to her.

As the pilot watched, Samus quickly looked over the computer, getting the overall workings of the device before...shoving her arm cannon into the info port of the computer, which was only meant for data chips and USB drives, much to Jack's displeasure.

"You're going to pay for..."

"Don't." as if right on que, the Spartan cut him off.

"Oh come on man! she just...didn't you...what the hell!"

He just waved him off, "You asked for this." and went right back to work.

Jack growled at his friend's clear disrespect for his things, well until he noticed the computer's monitor start to flash and form a picture.

It was fuzzy at first, but it soon took shape:

* * *

_Loading data...Loading Complete._

_Location: Tallon IV; Phendrana Drifts; Research Labs._

_Mission: Locate and destroy Space Pirate Commander Ridley; discover source of Phazon infection._

_Weapon Systems:_

_Arm cannon: Charge beam; Wave beam; Ice Beam; Missiles; Super Missiles._

_Visor: Combat mode; Scanning mode; Infrared mode._

_Power suit status: Gravity suit; Morph ball; Power Ball;_

_Reasabling connection._

* * *

The screen went blank again, then went through a long detailed section of code, before finally transferring into a first person veiw of Samus's visor.

* * *

_After destroying the last of the air-bound Space pirates, Samus blasted the formerly locked door with her wave beam, opening it. Walking down a small hallway, Samus then noticed a elevator, and seeing no other alternative, she activated it, going even further into the labs of her enemy._

The screen went to static once again, then switched back to the sight of Samus activating another door, exiting a long tunnel.

_This room was small...well smaller than the last few Samus had been to while searching the labs. Along the walls was several interfaces with data continuously running back and forth through screens. But in the enter of the room was a large testing chamber, and within it was a single floating Metroid._

_Her weapon aimed at the creature, a processed to stroll around the room, scanning the data while keeping a eye on the creature she hated. And in a matter of seconds, the said creature smashed the container that it was contained in and rushed at Samus, flying through the air with its teeth bared._

_Dodging the small terror, she charged her cannon and fired a shot, nailing the Metroid in the center of its shiny little head._

_While that did knock it back a few feet, it returned to its assault moments later. Dodging a few more rushes, Samus struck the Metroid once again with a charged shot, only for it to explode this time around. Noticing no more containers, Samus returned to the task of scanning the data the Pirates had stored, but before she could finish a large pirate smashed through one of the walls that made up the room and charged at the hunter. Quickly blasting it with a well placed missile, Samus turned her attention to the place where that pile of ash came from. Noticing another whole room with even more pirates inside, she quickly charged another shot before jumping in._

_When she landed a eire silence took the area by storm, the Pirates were staring at her with sweat dripping from their necks, and Samus was just waiting for one of them to make a move so she could blast it. This silence lasted before a single noise shattered it, and this did not come from Samus or the pirates, but the Metroids trapped in their containment tubes._

_With a terriblescreach, the Metroids burst from their prisons and rushed anything near them, Space pirate and Bounty hunter alike. Samus took aim and blasted any Metroid that came at her, but the pirates were having a much harder time dealing with them than she did._

_One by one, the Metroids attached themselves to the pirates, draining them of their energy. The pirates that were lucky enough to not be attacked by a Metroid tried to help their doomed allies but that caused more problems than it solved. Their attempts to detach the Metroids either killed the unfortunate space pirate that it was stuck to or caused the Metroid to release its prey and attack the one who removed it, either way it didn't end well._

_It only took five minutes, five minutes for every Space pirate to be reduced to a lifeless corpse, leaving Samus to deal with a horde of Metroids by herself._

* * *

The video was about to continue before Samus removed her weapon from the keyboard, making the recording disappear.

The reactions were different to say the least.

Saying Jack was surprised would be an major understatement, his jaw has now resting on the floor and his eyes looked like they belonged in a cartoon, and yet after all of that he was still kind of mad at the broken computer.

The Spartan was intrigued by the strange creatures, they reminded him of the flood with their lethality only.

And Samus was indifferent ofcourse, having been there first hand and being the only one present to have actually fought Metroids, she already knew what to expect.

Silence took hold of the trio once more leaving the three warriors to think the same thought, _'This is getting annoying'_

But while the three were trying to gather up something to start up a conversation with, they failed to notice the approaching sights of multiple enemy contacts nearing the ship's landing site.

One of these such contacts, were monstrous indeed. They didn't walk through the deserted ruins like others seemingly would have, no, they stalked their way through it, like a wild animal or skilled hunter would have. Their crude weapons, armor, and even their smell could tell a tale about these monsters, for the Brutes got their name for a reason, and its not for being a tactical honorable warriors like the Elites were, no they were the opposite, angry, bloodthirsty, and naive. The Covenant had found them (maybe Jack should have thought of the Covies before setting off a bomb on a dragon's head).

All of this was a dangerous combination for any enemy, especially the trio that was still unaware of the pack slowly coming their way, thanks to the scent of a dragon (slightly roasted) they noticed before his 'unfortunate' predicament.

They all were in a typical mood for a Brute, an ape with too much muscle and too little brains, But one was different, his rage was not aimed at nothing, but he was furious at a certain duo of armored foes he met on the field of battle not that long ago.

He still wore his armor, untouched from the battle, the scorch mark from a certain bounty hunter's charged shot still landed at the center of his chest. But his face now had a fairly painful looking tear down the left side, from the top of his forehead to where hie armor covered it up. And even his eye was missing, the clear punishment he received from his master after he allowed the _'demon'_ the escape. Marked with eternal punishment by the pack leader, until he brings the _'demon's'_ head

But all the while the brute's prey still had no idea of the approaching force heading towards them, as they were much more focused on a more important subject, trying to break the annoying silence that took the ship by storm. All three (or at least the two armored ones) were never really conversationalists.

Samus had never really need to anyway, having gotten quite used to her lone wolf bounty hunter lifestyle.

Spartans ofcourse were known by their silent killer juggernaut status, the only time a Spartan really openly talked to other was around other Spartans, and seeing how there were no other Spartans around, he stayed silent.

But out of all of them, Jack was the biggest surprise, for even being a grade-A sniper he was normally a chatter box whenever he wasn't looking through a scope. Apparently he was mostly talkative when either was bragging about something or annoying his teammates (something that's gotten his mouth covered with ducktape on more than one occasion), but both of those reasons were thrown out the window at this point.

So after the utmost amount of time, Jack had an idea (think giant light bulb above his head).

"Hey, which one of you guys got the bigger kill count?"

The two of them looked at him with dumbfounded/amused looks on their faces (which Jack didn't notice cause of the helmets) before answering, both still unaware of the Brute Captain lining up a shot with a beam rifle.

* * *

(1)- Think the Forge item from Halo 3.

Hey, sorry again abut this chapter being so short, Next chapter will have some action in it, as you can tell from the ending. I'll see you guys later.


	9. Note: Don't Kill Me! Please!

I'm sorry but this is not the next chapter to End of an Era: The Hunt, but before anyone tries to kill me with a pitchfork, let me explain some unfortunate news for you.

Currently I've grown to see that…well my first Fanfiction is a load of complete and utter bull. The title is stupid; the storyline is stupid, and overall is completely idiotic when it comes to Halo's canon. I failed to explain where my Spartan OC fit into the Halo cannon and despite if I was planning to explain his back-story in a series of flashbacks…ya I just can't see myself doing that now.

The story is stupid and idiotic. The idea of sending one of the only remaining Spartans in existence and a single marine to hunt down a single brute chieftain during the final battle on the Ark is really stupid. I mean what was I thinking when I thought of that pile of bull crap? At this moment I have no idea.

So I'm not really going to abandon this story but reimaging it. The whole Halo/Metroid crossover is obviously staying, but the storyline and characters will change to fit Halo's cannon and such.

My current idea is to turn it into a Halo Reach continuation fic, where Noble Six survives his battle on Reach and escapes onboard a covenant frigate. Here are some of the more obvious changes you'd see in the recreation.

1). My OC Spartan would basically become Noble Six from Halo Reach. Seeing how Noble Six is basically a clean slate throughout the game, my OC's personality won't change that much (not that I really created one for him in the current story anyway). His armor would also change to my Halo Reach armor permutations in multiplayer/single player.

2). The story would obviously take place right after Noble Six's last stand after the Pillar of Autumn's escape from Reach. Now I have not yet fully thought out the plot for the most part (something I really should have done in the original), but I do have a vague idea of what I'm going to do.

(Enter Vague Plot intro)

The idea is that after his close encounter with death at the hands of the elites, Noble Six escaped and with the Dots help was able to repair his armor and make a vague plan to escape the doomed planet. After boarding a Covenant frigate before the final glassing of the planet the Spartan attempted to hide away on board the ship until there was a safe attempt to escape to his freedom. This soon fails after he is discovered and a titanic battle for survival takes place onboard the ship. Soon after a encounter with some hunters, the ship's slipspace drive is damaged.

(End Vague Plot intro)

Now I know this is really blunt but I couldn't really tell you more without giving away the first few chapters. But most of you could guess that it would eventually lead to a crashed ship, Space pirates showing up, and Samus and Noble Six kicking Covenant/Space pirate ass.

Now some of you may be annoyed by this and angry at me for taking this road. But really, I just despise my original attempt at this fanfiction, it makes no sense and I just plain want to fix it. I'm not going to set this story as complete just yet though. When I publish the first chapter of the recreation I'll make a very small final chapter to this one to notify you all about it and then set it as complete. Once again I'm sorry for all of this, but this is all I can do to continue this in any way possible. I just cannot continue the story as it is now, I just can't.

Thank you anyone who can put up with my (in my opinion) bullshit and hopefully you'll stick around when I publish my remake. Thanks for the patience and see you later.

-DarkDemon619-


End file.
